BW 1: Blast to the Past
by Karra Greenfield
Summary: One moment she was enjoying the relative peace that Cybertron for several hundred stellar cycles after the return of the "Lost Heroes" with the leader of the rogue gang that had stolen the Autobot's greatest artifact, the Golden Disk. Now, with Megatron escaped from prison and heading back into the past once more, it is up to her to fix the history that her Grand-spaker shared.
1. Prologue

One cycle she was attending yet another gathering the Earth ambassador was throwing, running security detail as the silver haired woman and the hoard of humans that stayed with her 'rubbed elbows' with the Cybertronian elite, both Maximal and Predacon alike, the next cycle she was waking up with a terrible headache wanting to let go of the energon she took in before heading off to her assignment. A bright light shone in her optics, making the pain worse for a few clicks, as a stressed, but thoughtful voice graced her audio receptors.

"Good," the male voice said as the light finally shut off, "it looks like I was able to reach you in time."

"What's wrong?" She said, sitting up with his help, "Was the party attacked?"

"Not so much, no." The almost ancient Maximal said as he walked over to his work table to set down the tool in his other hand, "but we don't have much time." Turning back to face her, the green-based and silver-trimmed bot before her sighed deeply. "I managed to place both of us in a time stasis field, but I'm not sure how long it will last. The others…" he trailed of as he closed his eyes, his jaw firm for a moment as he found his words, "Megatron has found a way to win the Beast Wars."

"How?" she stumbled to her feet, "Grand-sparker… you said…"

"Things have changed, young one," he told her gently, grabbing a hold of her shoulders with both hands to help keep her upright. "Cybertron has changed. Things are not as they were and there's only the two of us left to fix it."

Nodding, she squared her shoulders, looking into his optics. "Tell me what I need to do."

"We need to secure a ship," he began, looking over at his work table, "one with a transwarp engine. With a slight modification I will be able to send you back." Pointing to dark red half orb on the upper part of her torso plating, which he had a matching one on the bestial mouth that made up his torso plating, he quickly explained, "This was just something I was able to put together quickly. When you get the opportunity, you'll need to figure out how to make the necessary upgrades to it to make it last."

"You're not coming with me?"

Shaking his head sadly, he gently patted her cheek. "I cannot. I'm too old to be of any good." He turned to lead her through a series of tunnels that ran through parts known as Old Cybertron, "Also, if I go back, I risk corrupting the timeline worse. I can't make direct contact with Optimus Primal and the others without risking a paradoxical episode, especially if I come in contact with myself. You, on the other hand, know almost everything that had happened and will know what changes have occurred."

"But what if Megatron has come in contact with himself?" she asked, her spark pulsing wildly with panic. "That would have caused a paradox effect."

"Megatron is smart enough to know that if he did there would be nothing left for him to rule."

They continued on in silence, necessary for survival in the "brave new world" that Megatron's iron-fisted rule had engulfed the planet in. The Cybertron they once knew was gone; corrupted. The free society established by her ancestors suddenly replaced by a fear-based authoritarian police state. Vehicons patrolled through the air over the darkened surface. It only made their going slower as they were forced to stay to the shadows. This was not the home she knew. Not the same place she was sparked and raised. This alien world frightened her.

The space port was a difficult to navigate with most of the area being a wide open field that they had to manage to scurry across silently. Waiting under the shadow of the wings of their chosen craft for one of the patrols to pass, the pair managed to get onto the ship before the next one passed.

Watching as her Grand-sparker pulled off a side panel to the controls and begin his work, she frantically began the struggle to recall everything he had told her while she was growing up as she kept watch for any possible attackers. The stories of friends gained and lost over the long solar cycles and the enemies she was about to come face to face with. With the tension so high, the work her Grand-sparker was doing seemed to take forever. She knew he was being as cautious as he could afford to, but there wasn't much time left.

"You must be careful not to reveal who you really are, not even to me," he told her quietly, "Your mission is to make sure the past doesn't truly change, but if any of the others know that you come from the future then you risk causing a paradox."

"Paradoxes are bad," she mumbled, then crouched behind the control chair as a Vehicon passed by. "They'll detect us soon if we don't hurry."

"I've done what I can here," her Grand-sparker said as he stood up, pulling out a legendary chain gun from his subspace pocket. "Pilot the ship. Once you're far enough away from the planet the transwarp engine will take over and take you back. Find the Axalon as quickly as you possibly can. I'll draw them off."

She quickly hugged her Grand-sparker and he returned the gesture with his free arm before pushing her away to pull out his other weapon. Sharing a curt nod, she watched him run to the back of the ship to exit it, her spark aching at this being the last possible time she would see him. When she heard the scream of approaching Vehicons and the laser shots they fired at their target, she rushed to the pilot's chair and began to start the ship up. She didn't even have a chance to lift off of the ground before she heard his weaponry begin the rapid fire they were famous for.

More Vehicons rushed towards her as she piloted the ship off of the metallic ground, shooting into the air faster than her instructors had told her was safe. If any of them were there, no doubt their survival would warrant a bit of caution thrown to the wind. Thanks to a couple of her uncles, she had learned to fly a ship almost as well as they could fly themselves. Even though it was a foreign design to what she was use to, the ship danced under her command as she pivoted and spun around her attackers. She only began to worry as more and more laser shots began to come from behind her, several striking the rear shielding of the ship. Eventually she was able to break through the atmosphere, which left her attackers stranded on the planet, their individual thrusting systems not powerful enough to follow her. But the damage was already done.

The shields didn't hold up as well as she would have liked, the aft section of the ship now held several compromised areas. The artificial gravity generator, located in the back of the ship as well, was also damaged, which sent her floating up out of her seat. In a state of limbo, she watched as the debris that littered the small cabin float around her as the ship slowly spun through space, the only thing keeping it moving in its original direction was the momentum left over before the thrusters had gone offline. The secondary shielding around the transwarp engine must have held up though, since the ship had not exploded yet.

When the damaged ship sensed that it was far enough away from Cybertron's pull, the programming her Grand-sparker had coded into it kicked in. The sudden jolt forward of the ship sent her flying backwards, the back wall of the cabin greeting her painfully as the view port before her lit up in a colorful display of a transwarp tunnel. She was unsure of how long it took her through the tunnel, but the vortex eventually opened up before her ship, spitting her out violently. She watched helplessly as her ship spun wildly towards the mostly blue and green planet with its two moons. What was left of her ship after the crash was little more than the cockpit, its structure holding enough for her to survive the crash but it knocked her offline.

**Author's Note: I don't own Beast Wars/Beasites.**

Rebooting/reworking an old old work that I had started back in high school (10+ years ago). Making a lot of changes, all of which I hope is for the better, but the premise is still the same. Basically, I'm seeing how well this goes over. This might be a one shot, or I might work on it as a series as the original had become.

Thanks for reading.


	2. Chapter 1

Chapter 1

Optimus Primal was doing his usual patrol as the sun was setting. Approaching the Axalon, he transformed and sat quietly on the roof of the ship to watch as the colors faded gracefully from the fiery reds and golds into the dark purples and blacks of the cool nights. The twin moons were full, both still low in the sky as the stars began to twinkle around them. It gave the Maximal leader a few cycles of peace, a moment's respite from the almost constant fighting with the Predacons, but only a few.

With a deep sigh, the Maximal commanded the top door that opened onto the bridge to grant him access and leapt down into the room below. Rhinox, who was the only other one on the bridge of the ship at that moment, didn't look over at the thud that sounded when Primal landed. There was something on the scanner screens that held the Maximal engineer's attention. After the recent issue with new security system, Sentinel, Rhinox had been working on making sure all the bugs were completely out of the system. It was thanks to Rattrap's quick thinking and infiltration skills that they still had their ship to call home. Walking on all fours over to his friend's side, Primal looked from the gold and green based bot to the screen before him. This wasn't the same coding that he had been working on in regards to Sentinel.

"The ship's sensors detected a ship that broke through the planet's atmosphere a few nanocycles ago," Rhinox said, not looking at the bot at his side.

"Are you sure it's a ship and not one of the pods?" the Maximal leader asked, not truly questioning his friend, more disbelieving that there was any other ships out in this area.

"It's giving off a transwarp signature," he replied simply, "a Predacon signature."

"Megatron has reinforcements coming to his aid?" Primal was looking up at the screen.

"I'm not sure." Rhinox singled out a line of coding in the transwarp signature, "This is an old Maximal refugee distress coding."

"How did it end up in the transwarp signature?"

"I have no idea," came the quiet reply, "except that a Maximal refugee or two had no choice but to steal a Predacon ship to escape."

The computer systems beeped urgently. "Warning," came the male voice of the system, "ship's structure deteriorating. Crash imminent."

"Well that's just prime," Optimus mumbled. "Optimus, Maximize!" Transforming back into his full robotic structure, Primal gave his orders as he waited for the upper access door to open. "Have Dinobot and Rattrap rendezvous with me at the coordinates. If we do have Maximals on that ship then we need to secure them. No doubt Megatron has detected the ship, too."

"And what if Predacons are on the ship?" Rhinox asked, his chair half turned around to look at his leader.

"Then I want their support in case a fire fight breaks out," Primal gravely answered. Looking up, he bent his knees slightly, "Jets, maximum burn!" And the Maximal leader rocketed out of the ship, the hatchway closing behind him.

On the Darkside, the Predacon computer was urgently notifying Megatron of the descending ship. The cool, female voice listing off the crash site trajectory as the purple Predacon leader scratched the dino-head that covered his right hand.

"A Predacon ship?" he began, "choosing to crash here? What are the odds… yeesss." Swiftly his chair turned at his mental command as he faced into the rest of the room. "Waspinator! Terrorsaur!" The two Predacon flyers appeared on the hover platforms that they utilized in accessing the ship and saluted. "Go to these coordinates and bring the passengers of that ship here."

"Ooooooo!" the wasp said after he transformed into his beast mode, "Wazzpinator will get there firzzt!"

Terrorsaur transformed as well, flapping his wings to hover next to his fellow flyer, giving a screeching caw, "Not if I beat you to it!"

And the pair took off, leaving Megatron shaking his head with a sigh. The only reason he had chosen those two was the speed they had due to their flight capabilities. No doubt the Maximals had detected the ship as well and Optimus Primal was on his way there. Hopefully the Predacons on the ship would give aid in a firefight against the Maximal.

She woke up, finding herself trapped between a broken pilot's chair and the console that she used to pilot the craft. Any movement sent pain shooting through her circuitry, but she couldn't stay idle. She had no idea how long she had been out, but she recalled her Grand-sparker's words about the unstable energon fields and what it did to unprotected bots. The first thing she did was double check to make sure the device her Grand-sparker had put on her was still alright, worried that the crash could have damaged it in some way and jeopardize her mission before it even began. Then, putting everything she could into shoving the heavy chair off of her, she managed to pull herself from the wreckage and look around.

Rocks made up some of the décor of the ship now, control panels sparking as the power running through them faded in and out. She'd be fortunate if the emergency life-form scanning device was still intact. Although gaining a beast mode without the aid of a CR chamber or vat was a painful process, it would be necessary. Crawling over to the panel, she let out a relived sigh as she saw it was still functional. With a quick input of the commands, the computer sent up the scanning probe in search of anything left in the area after the crash. There was not much to choose from, only a handful of animals that would complements her size well. With a quick pick of an animal, she let the beast mode adaptor take over.

Waspinator and Terrorsaur slowly hovered over the wreckage, a slow burn of some of the tree and underbrush from the crash along the jagged rut it had left. Parts of the ship were spread over several hundred miles as it had fallen apart in the atmosphere.

"Wazzpinator wonderz if there are zurviveorz," the giant wasp said as they looked down at the badly damaged ship.

"We better go take a look," the pterodactyl replied before transforming to land near the ship. Waspinator transformed as well, landing next to his partner and began searching the wreckage for any survivors.

In shadows amongst the trees, a pair of large black eyes watched the Predacons as they inspected the ship. Now it was time for her first choice in this whole mess: did she choose to join up with the Predacons to keep an eye on things over there or did she join up with the Maximals?

Her being with the Maximals meant that she would be able to help them directly against any attack that the Megatron from the future might do. She also would be with bots she could trust. There was also the part of her that was curious to see the interactions they had with one another during this time in their lives.

If she joined up with the Predacons, there was always the problem of keeping up the ruse with Megatron and the other Predacons. Once Megatron got any notion from her that she wasn't at all on his side her life was easily forfeit. Granted, she could always join up with the Maximals at that time, but she recalled her Grand-sparker telling her how much trouble they had in trusting both Dinobot and Blackarachnia when they joined. Also, she would be forced to fight _against_ family. In her spark she knew she wouldn't be able to do that.

Then Maximals it is.

Looking up at the dark, smoky sky, she saw another flyer coming in. It must be Optimus Primal. From what her Grand-sparker told her, Airazor did not utilize any jet propulsion for her flight. Looking back at the wreckage, she watched as the two Predacon flyers took off to begin their attack on the Maximal one. Even with the fighting skill she knew Primal to possess, it would look better for her and her cause to aid him.

Mentally giving the command to transform, she pointed both arms out straight, the compartments around her wrists opening up in a large circular device around both of her closed fists, and began to fire from her own mini- chainguns.

Neither Predacon was prepared for an attack from the ground; the wasp was the first one to go down. The pterodactyl's attention was solely on the wasp as it began to spiral out of control, bouncing off of ship and trees below, that when he did look back up it was just in time to receive a punch to the face from Primal.

Terrorsaur fell, but was able to catch himself before hitting the ground. Looking over at where the shots were coming from, he spotted the figure in the trees. Upon seeing him, the bot in the trees took off quickly, running through the heavily wooded area. With an angry screech, he took off after the figure in the shadows.

Primal watched from the air as Terrorsaur took off after the apparent Maximal or Maximals that were in the ship. One look at Waspinator showed that the poor bug bot was too busy below trying to pick up the pieces that he had lost. Nodding to himself he took off after the bug's partner. Dinobot and Rattrap should be here shortly.

She ran, her cooling system taking in air rapidly. She made the mistake of glancing back, seeing the frightening figure dodging around the trees, anger burning in his optics. With her attention behind her, she did not see the large, jagged root sticking out of the ground. With a painful yelp, she fell face first in the dirt before she felt something grab her. In the air, before she could even realize what had happened, she looked up at the Predacon that was holding her by her upper arms.

"You made a terrible mistake, Maximal," Terrorsaur snarled at her, "one that you will pay for with your life!"

"In your dreams," she quipped, twisting her left arm around and aimed her fist towards his face. Terrorsaur barely had an instant to move his head out of the way before a steam of bullets met his face point blank. With a shout of anger and pain, the Predacon let her go, sending the Maximal fem free-falling in the night sky.

Optimus Primal, who was doing his best to catch up to them, watched Terrorsaur let go of his captive before he flew off towards the Predacon base, laser shots of both green and redish-yellow following the retreating Pred as Dinobot and Rattrap gave Optimus cover fire. Rushing forward to catch the Maximal, Primal watched as it transformed into its beast mode, something that apparently looked like a flying carpet with claws and a tail, and began to glide towards the ground.

She landed harshly, rolling several times before she managed to come to a stop. Waiting there, catching her breath, she listened as the Maximals moved in closer to her. As two of them made their way into the small group of saplings she landed in, she slowly gained her feet. One of them was tall, really tall, his coloring in duel shades of brown. _Must be Dinobot,_ she thought as she turned to look at the shorter one at his side. He was mostly copper with silver detailing, and a grayish brown beast form over his armored plating. _Must be Uncle Rattrap before he became a transmetal._

Grunting at the pair, she looked up with them as Optimus Primal landed and looked down at her. "That's quite an interesting beast mode you've got there. My name is Optimus Primal. We detected the Maximal refugee signal that your ship was sending out."

She nodded thoughtfully, looking down at the ground before she gave the empathic command to transform. Her animal head covered her torso area and her body split, the limbs resting along her back as her arms and legs came out, her long bushy tail curling up behind her. The fur of her beast body was mostly brown on the back with a patch of darker brown, almost black, running down her back and tail with a white underbelly. Ironically, she looked quite a bit like Rattrap in that regard. Her inner body was mostly in green and gold. "That must have been my Grand-sparker's doing." Looking up at Optimus, she squared her shoulders. "My beast mode is a flying squirrel. It was the only one that best complemented my size."

"What's your name?" the Maximal leader asked gently.

Looking down at her beast head, she could see the red device that her Grand-sparker created to protect her from being erased. Looking up at her commanding officer, she nodded, as if confirming something in her head first. "Ruby. My name is Ruby."

**Author's Note: I don't own the show!**

Thanks to my hubby for letting me use his beloved pet flying squirrel Ruby as the basis for her beast mode and name.


	3. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

It was a slow walk back to the Axalon, but the four Maximals slowly made their way. Optimus had spent too much time in his robot mode and he had a build-up of the unstable energon in his systems and needed the time in beast mode so his body could process it out of its system. He also didn't wish to scare off their latest addition by leaving her alone with Rattrap and Dinobot. Glancing back at the rather sizeable flying squirrel, he noticed how she was quietly studying each of them as they made their way through the trees.

Ruby had insisted that the ship contained no personal items, at least of her own. That it just happened to be the ship that her and her Grand-sparker had managed to board before their attackers could find them, and that the older Maximal had sent her to safety at the possible sacrifice of his own life.

Primal could tell that she wasn't giving him the whole truth, but the amount of emotion she was struggling with in her voice told him that she might not be ready to open up completely yet. After all, they were all strangers to one another. Looking forward again to keep an optic out for trouble, he couldn't shake the feeling that she looked familiar.

"Do you mind, vermin?" Dinobot snarled, "Some of us would like to enjoy the quiet."

"Eh, dere is no quiet with all yer stompin' around, Chopper-face," the five foot tall rat quipped back before turning his attention back to Ruby. "So, whacha do before ya hopped on a Pred ship 'n get yerself caught up in our lil' war?"

"Security detail for the Earth diplomat," Ruby answered, knowing that there had been an Earth representative on Cybertron since Spike Witwicky.

"You left the Earth diplomat alone?" Primal asked, looking back at her.

Ruby shook her head, "I was knocked offline and my Grand-sparker found me, fixed me up, and helped me escape. Everyone else was gone."

Frowning to himself, the silver back gorilla continued forward. It was a troubling thought that the Predacons would have done something so drastic in the wake of the Golden Disk theft. Or perhaps it was exactly what they were waiting for. Unfortunately, they were trapped on an unknown planet with no foreseeable means of escaping the planet at the moment and were unable to help the uprising that was happening back home.

Unsure if it was the recent information that she had given or the fact that they all were tired, since it was the middle of the night, but the rest of the trip was made in relative silence.

Megatron glared at the two injured Pred flyers as they stood on the hovering platforms before him. Terrorsaur's armor was scorched and dinged where he had been hit while Waspinator was almost falling apart before him, his arms struggling to hold the parts that he was able to gather before fleeing.

"You mean to tell me that a Maximal stole a Predacon ship and just happened to crash land _HERE_?" The two cringed, which was the Predacon leader's intent, but he just sat back to think on this unexpected matter. Why would a Maximal steal a Predacon ship? Could the Maximals have welcomed a criminal into their folds? "This certainly deserves to be looked into, yes." With a twist of his chair to face away from the pair, he waved his hand dismissively. "Go get yourselves repaired. I'll need you two scouting the newest in Optimus' crew as soon as possible."

With a salute, or as near to one that Waspinator could manage as he dropped a good chunk of the parts in his arms, the pair disappeared further into the ship. Megatron opened a channel to his most trusted subordinate. "Scorponok, I have an important mission for you."

The group of four split in half, Rattrap and Dinobot going up the lift first while Primal and Ruby waited for its return. Sentinel had to scan and accept her as part of the crew before she could enter the ship. Her commanding officer looked back down at her, watching as she took in the broken ship, her eyes alit with wonder as if she was seeing a legend for the first time. Giving a shake of his head, he looked up as the lift began to lower. "Welcome to the Axalon, Ruby."

"Thank you, sir," she said. It was a near whisper, matching her tone to her look. She seemed almost giddy and nervous at the same time as they both stepped onto the platform. She was braced as it jerked to lift them up, her fluffy tail curled up over her back as she was looking up.

When the glass door lifted up for them, allowing them access to the bridge, they both stepped off of the lift and entered the room. Cheetor was there, his night for monitor duty, but was listening to Rattrap and Dinobot, who were now in robot mode, 'debating' on who was going to show their newest team member around the ship.

Optimus transformed, making his way over to get an update from the scout of the team. Not wanting to miss out on meeting the flying squirrel, the cheetah based fighter was making his way back over with Optimus. Slow, steady footsteps were making their way from the hall on the right hand side of the bridge, as the ship's engineer walked in, tinkering with something in his hands.

"Oh, Rhinox," Optimus said, smiling, "I was about to call you." Motioning to her with one hand, giving her permission with the gesture to transform, Primal began his introduction. "Cheetor, Rhinox, this is Ruby. She was on the ship that has crashed."

Ruby, who had transformed into her own robot mode, gave a meek nod. But everyone could see how she was just staring at Rhinox. They just assumed that it was because of his size, which was impressive, but Optimus was bothered by something. They had the same coloring to the robotic forms. It wasn't a bad color combination, but what were the chances that two random bots both chose the exact same colors?

Ruby couldn't believe her eyes. Here was her Grand-sparker, looking so much younger than she could ever recall. Even with his coloring different, the gold replaced by silver several stellar cycles ago, there was no mistaking that kind, warm smile. Stretching out her hand to shake the one he offered to her, she returned the smile brightly. "It's a pleasure to meet all of you."

"How 'bout a tour of da ship?" Rattrap offered, giving her a half smile as he offered his arm playfully.

Ruby had to fight smirking at him. This was the same uncle that put any bot that had any intention of coming near her through the wringer for her own protection. She recalled him saying that it was to make sure she wasn't hurt by a bot with poor intentions for her. Now it made sense to her, realizing how he behaved himself around fems, that he would know what to look for. Turning her attention back to Rhinox she only smiled. "Do you mind? I'm sure you know the ship better than anyone else."

Feeling a bit caught, Rhinox looked over at Optimus, who nodded once, and then turned to the small fem before him. She stood just over Rattrap's height in robot form, but there was something about her he couldn't put his servo on. Not just yet. "Well," he said giving a vague wave of his hand to the room they were currently in, "this is the bridge, the main hub of our communications and sensors." And the pair started off down the hallway he had entered the room from, Rhinox talking and Ruby listening to every word, as if she was gleaning every detail she could.

**Author's Notes: I don't own this show.**

Thanks for reading, because I know no one made you do it!


	4. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Naturally she expected the Maximals to keep an extremely close eye on her, since she was new with a questionable origin. Ruby was only alone when she was in her quarters, though the others checked on her often, but she didn't really mind. This was putting a whole new side to bots she spent most of her life around.

She had worked under Optimal Optimus since passing basic and advanced training. He was the one responsible for getting her the job on the security team that's sole purpose was to protect the Human diplomat. The first two were nice enough, but she was having trouble liking the latest one.

Cheetor was so young and hyper. It was hard for Ruby to believe that she had more experience in fighting than this Maximal. He had taught her so much, between hand to hand combat to more advanced weapon systems. He had even helped her design her wrist weaponry, her miniature chain guns, as a little homage to her favorite Maximal.

Rattrap surprised her, constantly hitting on her every chance he was given, but Ruby took it in stride. She knew her Uncle was relatively harmless and was having his fun, that this was a way he de-stressed from the fighting. Well that, and picking fights with Dinobot.

She had not had a chance to know Dinobot except for what her Grand-sparker and the others had told her. Despite their almost constant bickering, she could see the brotherly like friendship between Rattrap and Dinobot, though still in the very early stages. The former-Predacon warrior was still on thin ice around the others, but she knew that would change with time. He said a lot through what he did that spoke louder to her than words. The stories she heard was from their perspective of the dinosaur based Maximal, but seeing it first hand, with the insider knowledge she had, gave her a deeper understanding as she watched him. When she was given the preference, she chose to either work with Rhinox or Dinobot. Both were reserve around her, but found her too efficient in her duties to really complain about the arrangement.

There were also a few patrols she had joined Tigatron on, another Maximal that she had not had a chance to know beforehand. Her Uncle Cheetor had shared with her about his best friends Tigatron and Airazor, and Ruby had to admit she was quite eager to meet the other Maximal fem. She knew what was the fated for the three and had planned to cherish every moment she could with them.

There was some benefit to helping out so much with the repairs of the Axalon; aside from spending even more time with the Maximal she missed the most. She had access to a lot of spare, 'unusable' parts that she tucked away to use later. There was a personal issue she had to attend to.

In the quiet of her still barren room, Ruby sat at the desk, the scan readout of the device her Grand-sparker had saved her life with on the small computer screen scrolling slowly. She was using them to build a new device, or at least attempt to. She didn't want to risk removing the device, not knowing exactly what would happen if she did, so with the information she gleaned from the scans she worked on building a brand new device.

It was here she was tinkering in early hours of the morning, unable to sleep from the events of the night before. One of the stories she was told had just come to pass, and growing up listening to them over and over again she thought she knew what to expect. It actually frightened her to see Optimus acting out in pure rage, going temporarily insane thanks to the virus that Scorponok injected into his system. Even though they told it to her, both as sharing what they had learned from the experience and as something that they had looked back on with some humor, actually living it out with them put a raw edge to the war stories. Though, the idea of one of Megatron's schemes backfiring so badly was humorous.

This also gave her a more defined time frame of where exactly she landed. Her Grand-sparker made sure to send her early enough into the Beast Wars to catch any possible change, though if she knew that she'd go back like this, she would have spent more time listening to the stories.

With a quiet expulsion of air, she went back to work. She was to relieve Dinobot of his watch of their still recovering leader in a few mega-cycles and she wanted to get as much work done on the device as she possibly could.

It was a long, hard, and exhausting battle to get away from the Vehicons, always trying to keep an eye out for his little Grand-sparkling's ship until the bright light of the transwarp portal winked in the sky. His spark pulsed harshly in his chest as he caught the wave of Vehicons following the ship until it was too far away. Once she was safely on her journey, Rhinox made his way back to the lower levels of Old Cybertron, groaning as he shoved large pieces of metal supports over the opening.

After taking a deliberately confusing route to get back to his hidden laboratory, the now silver and green bot grabbed one of his repair tools and began work on fixing up the damage he had taken during the firefight. It was here, as he thought about the unknown he sent her to, that something odd happened. He paused, staring into nothing, and couldn't help but smile.

She had made it. Dinged up a bit from her arrival, but she made it. And he could feel his memories alter as she wiggled her way into that era of his life so long ago, the one she practically begged him and those that survived with him to share with her every time she was with them. Chuckling, he went back to work, entertained by the new memories.

To be continued?

**Author's Note: I don't own the show.**


End file.
